The Fatal Fare
"The Fatal Fare" is the twenty-eighth episode of Justice League Action. Summary Superman is being held and tortured by Darkseid after having foiled his attempt to invade Earth but Space Cabby learns of this when he happens to give a ride to the villain and calls in the Justice League. Featuring Story A fleet of spaceships travels through space. Onboard one of them, a screen shows the face of the god-like Darkseid who issues a command to his lieutenant, Desaad, telling him to open a boomtube (a travel portal/tunnel) to begin the invasion of Earth. Kanto and a crew of parademons look on. They are being tracked, however, by Wonder Woman and Hawkman in Justice One. They despair that Darkseid's fleet is too far ahead to be stopped, but Superman, flying alongside, states that he will intercept them and flys off. As the fleet is entering the boomtube, Superman smashes his way into the lead ship causing the parademons to be sucked out. Proceeding through the ship, he encounters Desaad at the cube (called a motherbox) used to control the boomtube and pushes him out of the way. Superman fiddles with the cube causing it to change in some way which results in the fleet disappearing away to a different, unknown destination. Kanto paralyzes him with a kryptonite ray. Elsewhere in space, Space Cabby is taking a break for a meal while he watches a commercial for a rival passenger service of a space cyclist called Roxy Rocket. As he denigrates her, he receives a call for a cab and accelerates away. The destination, however, is soon shown to be Apokolips, the home planet of Darkseid. As Cabby waits there, Darkseid appears, gets in the cab and gives the destination as a moon of a particular planet. When Cabby, familiar with the place, naively tries to dissuade his passenger from going there, Darkseid menacingly tells him to get going. At the destination moon, Darkseid pays and leaves, but Space Cabby chases after him with the receipt. Searching around, he sees Darkseid's wrecked space fleet on the surface of the moon and goes inside one of the ships to see Superman being contained and tortured by Desaad, watched by Darkseid. When the latter asks about the state of the boomtubes, Kanto replies that their whole system has been infected with a virus and only Superman knows the code to remove it. Just then, Cabby makes a noise and has to flee back to his cab where he intends to inform the Justice League, but Darkseid stops him from driving away. The latter insists that he give his assassin, Kanto, a ride back to Apokolips. As Cabby is driving, Kanto asks for a detour to a planet that is obviously intended for disposing of his victims, but Cabby bluffs him into going to another planet that sounds equally suitable. Once there, in a swampy, jungle area, they get out and Kanto pulls a gun on Space Cabby, but the latter is grabbed by the local vegetation and seemingly hauled away to his doom. Then Kanto is also gripped by plant tendrils, but, when Cabby is released, the vegetation reveals itself as Swamp Thing, and it becomes clear that they are on Earth. Wonder Woman and Hawkman appear and praise Cabby for leaving his radio on so that they could follow him. While Wonder Woman takes Kanto to prison, Space Cabby drives the other two superheroes to where Superman is. Superman is being tortured with a kryptonite force-field while being interrogated by Darkseid to reveal the code. Cabby's vehicle then smashes through and into the spaceship, and, while Hawkman fights the parademons, Swamp Thing overwhems Darkseid with vegetation growth until Desaad starts to dry him out with a ray blast. But, finding a source of water, Swamp Thing grows huge and binds Desaad, then turns to help with the parademons. This allows Cabby to help Superman by getting his droid, Jack, to hack into the torture machine and remove the kryptonite. As Darkseid breaks free of Swamp Thing's tendrils, the liberated Superman batters him to the ground and then beckons to the controlling motherbox from which Atom then emerges, having been the source of its problem. With the motherbox now working, Superman opens a boomtube and kicks Darkseid into it, sending him to a remote planet. As the Justice League round up Desaad and the parademons into Justice One, Superman offers Space Cabby a ride as his cab was damaged in the fight. Cabby declines, saying that the droid will fix it but, after the League have left, finds that he is stranded. He is ignominiously forced to call on Roxy Rocket for a ride, but when she arrives, she says that she will also have to stop off at a remote planet to pick up a passenger called Darkseid much to Cabby's horror. Notes * Darkseid's Omega Effect is usually red and never misses its mark. In episode, his beams didn't chase after the target and were of a different color as opposed to later showings. Gallery Image1.png Category:Episodes